麒麟洞

Qilin Cave

Useful Information

Location:	No. 187, Zaoshan Road, Guiyang City, Yunyan District, Guiyang, Guizhou 550000. Guiyang city, northwest side of the city. (26.5971618, 106.6907408)
Open:	All year daily 6:30-22. [2025]
Fee:	free. [2025]
Classification:	Karst Cave
Light:	bring torch
Dimension:
Guided tours:	self guided
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:	no
Bibliography:
Address:	Qilin Cave, No. 187, Zaoshan Road, Guiyang City, Yunyan District, Guiyang, Guizhou 550000.
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

1530	Baiyi Temple built in front of the cave.
1941	General Zhang Xueliang imprisoned by Chiang Kai-shek in the cave.
1942	General Yang Hucheng imprisoned by Chiang Kai-shek in the cave.

Description

黔灵山公园 (Guiyang Qianling Mountain Park) is a typical tower karst landscape with forested hills and limestone towers. It is located in the middle of the province capital Guiyang, only 3 km from the city center. The main entrance is in the southeast of the park Qianlin mountain offers a lot for day visitors from the city, the Hongfu Buddhist temple, a cable car, Qinlin lake, the zoo, Qilin cave, two dams, and Sanlin Bay. The hill is full of monkeys, which seem to be the most popular thing to photograph.

麒麟洞 (Qilin Cave) is a natural cave chamber, which was often used during history and has now become a sort of historic museum. During the Chinese Civil War, the Chinese generals Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng were imprisoned inside the cave. The exhibition room displays articles used by the two generals. General Zhang Xueliang was imprisoned by Chiang Kai-shek from 1941 to 1942. General Yang Hucheng was imprisoned around the same time, and finally he and his family were killed by Chiang in 1949. Both generals were captured after the Xi'an Incident.

The cave is also transliterated as Kirin Cave, however, Quilin is the name of a legendary creature that appears in Chinese mythology. It is not possible to translate this word. The Qilin is a legendary hoofed chimerical creature with a single horn, which is the reason why it is wrongly translated as unicorn. Actually that’s nonsense, as it not a horse like creature, except for the hooves, the body often resembles a lion and the head is similar to a chinese dragon. The cave was formerly known as 汤山洞 (Tāngshāndòng, Tang Mountain Cave), after the name of the mountain where it is located.

And it was known as Baiyi Temple, which are actually the buildings in front of the cave entrance. However, the walls of this temple enclose the forecourt of the cave, the limestone cliff with the cave portal is the fourth wall. This temple was a place for nuns to practice. The actual prison and the museum are not inside the natural cave, though the name suggests this. The former temple building was used as prison and was restored in 1983 to house the museum. The cave itself contains a lot of statues of the Quilin and also contains a sort of rest area with food stalls. It is the begin of the tunnel across the karst tower to Quianling lake. The tunnel is mostly artificial and is illuminated by coloured light and kitschy light chains.